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I recently took delivery of my new Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone, replacing my servicable but niggly HTC HD2. Two days later I can honestly say I have never been as completely and thoroughly pleased by a purchase.
I've always been excited by the promise of smartphones. I had - still have, somewhere - an early Sony Ericsson effort, a resistive-screen monstrosity with a fold-down keyboard that covered half the crude, 12-bit screen. It played chess and someone made a port of Doom for it that was perfectly unplayable. It even had a web broswer for surfing on the go, a pleasantly futile piece of techno-joy since I never managed to go on a journey long enough for it to finish loading a page. It was bulky, ugly and creaky and the silver paint flecked off within weeks, but the sheer overreaching novelty of it was endearing.
Its would-be successor, on the other hand, was the opposite. The LG750 was absurdly pretty: sleek, slim and elegant next to the dumpy, frumpy Sony, and in a moment of mad lust I signed up to be subjected to one.
Never in human history has form triumphed so utterly over function. The glossy, glimmering touch-keypad would slide out with a soft, sensuous, yielding click, whereupon I would spend five increasingly desperate minutes trying to mash some approximation of a phone number into its pitilessly exacting surface. It was like trying to get Jessica Alba's knickers off with boxing gloves.
It had a capacitative screen, too - except the OS didn't actually support it. No, I'm not kidding. There was a touch application you could run that let you play a couple of humiliatingly bad 'games', but that was it. After spending a couple of weeks in a near-permanent state of rage, I flung the hateful thing away and went back to the Sony.
The iPhone, when released, I observed from a suspicious distance, as a camouflaged native might regard the strangely-dressed pale-skins intruding upon his jungle home, concerned that the magic picture-boxes they held might steal his essence. Here was something one could buy, and yet not truly own; direct, but not actually control. On occasion I picked them up in shops and prodded them, but was unable to shake the feeling that I was gripping the glowing appendage of something large, submerged and unseen.
Then came the HD2, which I bought because it wasn't an iPhone, and I cleaved to it with, in hindsight, undeserved fervour. It was a capable enough device but crippled by a schizophrenic OS: a slick HTC bumper-sticker on a clunky, Windows Mobile jalopy. I used it to play a couple of games, most notably a satisfyingly seditious port of Dungeon Master, but mostly for browsing. The out-of-phone sound was disappointingly tinny, the touch-screen disappointingly fidgety, the Sense UI disappointingly straight-laced, the app store disappointingly sparse and expensive - despite its utility in some ways I had less fondness for the machine than I'd had for the old Sony. It lacked the old phone's mad ambition: it was underwhelming at things that ought to have been straightforward, rather than being plain bad at things it had no business attempting in the first place.
Which brings us up to two days ago, when the first smartphone worthy of the name (that I've owned at any rate) arrived on my doorstep: the Galaxy Nexus.
Now we're talking.
The interface is, frankly, superb. I find the ever-present back, home, and multitasking soft-buttons, along with the occasional "..." drop-down menu faultlessly intuitive. I like the little status updates, notifications and messages in the little 'feed' strip at the top of the display. I love being able to metaphorically kick back, put my feet up and sprawl my contacts, applications and widgets across the home screens however I fancy. The app store feels fun, inviting and vibrant, not to mention desktop-PC fast to browse, as is the internet. I love the multitasking menu, and how effortlessly it does multitask. All in all, using it feels like being attended by a smooth and efficient butler, rather than the more normal sensation of trying to do a jigsaw in a biohazard suit.
Hardware-wise the 720p screen is just astounding: vivid, pin-sharp colours emerging from deep blackness. I watched the 'Black Soulstone' D3 trailer over and over, enthralled by the subtle tones and fine detail, and was also extremely pleased with the out-of-phone audio. More to the point it handles HD effortlessly, whether streamed or local. It's the first mobile device I would actually use for media by choice, even with a desktop or laptop machine nearby.
In terms of battery life, I personally don't have a problem; it fits well with my lifestyle. If I spent more time away from power it might be an issue (or else I'd invest in a USB power booster pack). The camera is (apparently) not the best for still shots, but serves my needs just fine and is nice and responsive. To be fair, anything that isn't a DSLR is going to struggle to make me care about image 'quality'.
In summary, I can't give any higher praise than to say the Samsung Galaxy Nexus is a smartphone. It's exactly what I always imagined such a device would be: a fantastic thing to have in your pocket.
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Glad you're enjoying it (= I'm so jealous ><
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I've got it as well.
Best android phone to date imo.
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i can't wait for cm9 to come out so i can flash it to my htc sensation.
the nexus phones have always been awesome.
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This is really the best of Android at this moment
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Ah yes, the good old Sony Ericsson P910 (am I right?). I had the same thing, thought it was the most awesome thing back then. It had like just enough room to fit all my, like 20, MP3's. That was if I converted them to OGG files instead of MP3's first.
+ Show Spoiler [Behold the beauty] +
Enjoy your new phone!
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On December 19 2011 21:35 disco wrote:Ah yes, the good old Sony Ericsson P910 (am I right?). I had the same thing, thought it was the most awesome thing back then. It had like just enough room to fit all my, like 20, MP3's. That was if I converted them to OGG files instead of MP3's first. + Show Spoiler [Behold the beauty] +Enjoy your new phone!
Spot on  The P910 was precisely the kind of device that made the iPhone a success.
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My galaxy S2 is amazing, makes me sad it was only king of android for the past three months. :-(
I dropped it in the toilet and it still works great!
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On December 19 2011 23:31 Horuku wrote:
My galaxy S2 is amazing, makes me sad it was only king of android for the past three months. :-(
I dropped it in the toilet and it still works great!
Well the Nexus hasn't got SD card slot or 8MP camera, so you can still say the S2 is king.
But both are amazing devices, and I can't believe I used to lust after that exact Sony Ericsson "smart"phone. How far we've come!
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On December 19 2011 23:31 Horuku wrote:
My galaxy S2 is amazing, makes me sad it was only king of android for the past three months. :-(
I dropped it in the toilet and it still works great!
lol! my S2 is the first phone in years thats rlly reminded me of that old Nokia phone, the indesctructable one 3310 I think it was.
Ive dropped it countless times, onto stone, tiles, pavement. immersed it in water accidently and other silly things and its suvived without a single scratch on the screen or almost all the phone at all. Only mark ive found is a slight tiny chip on the silver bezel that frames the rim from a particularly high drop (was higher than me and im 6 foot ^^) face down onto stown 
Makes me appreciate it so much more when I remember when my brother dropped his Iphone from waist height once - and he was usually so careful with it - onto the floor and the screen shattered.
lol "stown..." ill leave it in, as typo's go I quite like it ^^
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51416 Posts
ode to the indestructible s2. so many times i've dropped it on my floor thinking "FUCK I CANT BELIEVE IVE RUINED MY PHONE FUCK" only to pick it up and it looks good as new =]
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On December 20 2011 00:51 GTR wrote:
ode to the indestructible s2. so many times i've dropped it on my floor thinking "FUCK I CANT BELIEVE IVE RUINED MY PHONE FUCK" only to pick it up and it looks good as new =]
Same thing applies to the S1. I've carried it in my pocket without any protection for over a year, dropped it a few times and when I sold it there wasn't a scratch on it.
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On December 20 2011 00:51 GTR wrote:
ode to the indestructible s2. so many times i've dropped it on my floor thinking "FUCK I CANT BELIEVE IVE RUINED MY PHONE FUCK" only to pick it up and it looks good as new =]
Sounds about the same as me when my S2 slid out of my pants pocket right into the toilet. I was like OH SHIT ! (har har) and grabbed it right away (luckily the water was clean xD).
My roommate repairs phones for a living so he took it apart and scrubbed it with Isopropyl alcohol and said there wasn't any noticeable water damage. The battery lost all of its charge though (which is common, just a little water makes it drop all of its charge) and it wouldn't recharge. He got me an old S1 battery (1500mA), so it doesn't last quiet as long as the stock battery. The USB controller also got pretty jacked up and it wouldn't connect to my PC anymore...and listening to music was impossible because it would sit there in a "scan media" loop.
Amazingly after a couple weeks it seemingly fixed itself and USB connection worked again and playing music didn't cause a scan media loop anymore :D. Definitely super happy that my first smart phone (had a flip phone for close to 6 years ffs) wasn't dead.
Still debating on what kind of battery I want to get; get a pair of stock 1800mAs or get an extended battery for more weight.
The nexus is a great phone, but I didn't realize it didn't have SD or an 8mp camera. It's also only about .15in larger than the S2. The S2 is already kind of cumbersome to 'one hand,' I find it difficult to use my thumb to get to the top of the screen.
Has anyone heard of this: http://www.samsung.com/global/microsite/galaxynote/note/index.html?type=find ? Seems way better than the Nexus, and probably borderline tablet.
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8mp is pointless on a sensor that small. Personally I wish it was 2-3 mp and worked better in low light. Nor do I really care about the lack of an sd slot, although that's more of a personal usage thing.
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sorry to bump, but couldnt find anywhere else
but does anyone know how well the galaxy nexus handle 720p streams on twitch and own3d?
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On December 20 2011 02:55 Horuku wrote:Show nested quote +On December 20 2011 00:51 GTR wrote:
ode to the indestructible s2. so many times i've dropped it on my floor thinking "FUCK I CANT BELIEVE IVE RUINED MY PHONE FUCK" only to pick it up and it looks good as new =] The nexus is a great phone, but I didn't realize it didn't have SD or an 8mp camera.
This is coming back to haunt me. Last night, I put my 3 week-old, fully-charged Galaxy Nexus on the nightstand (but left it unplugged), went to sleep, and when I awoke seven hours later it was completely unresponsive. It won't turn on, charge, display a charging icon or LED light, or even reset.
I have insurance for the phone, but this raises two issues: First, nobody's phone should just stop working overnight for no reason, particularly a premier gadget like the Galaxy Nexus. Second, because it doesn't have an SD card (seriously, why?!), I lose the 200+ pictures I took on recent trips, aaand whatever confidential/personal info I have on that phone will be available to the first enterprising Verizon employee who figures out how to fix it once they give me a new one O.o
After this mishap, the annoying "no service" bug, and the lack of facebook contact integration (again, why?!) I would definitely take my Droid X back in a heartbeat.
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Did you try lifting the battery up and placing it back in?
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Almost bought this phone as my first smartphone, but opted for the RAZR instead. Ice Cream Sandwich is amazing and the 720p screen looks beautiful, but I trust Motorola's build quality a bit more (it's got freakin' Kevlar on the back!). And the SD support + 8MP camera also helped my decision.
They're both superb phones though, and from what I hear the Nexus is especially friendly for people looking to install custom ROMs.
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On January 22 2012 01:09 Gonff wrote:Show nested quote +On December 20 2011 02:55 Horuku wrote:On December 20 2011 00:51 GTR wrote:
ode to the indestructible s2. so many times i've dropped it on my floor thinking "FUCK I CANT BELIEVE IVE RUINED MY PHONE FUCK" only to pick it up and it looks good as new =] The nexus is a great phone, but I didn't realize it didn't have SD or an 8mp camera. This is coming back to haunt me. Last night, I put my 3 week-old, fully-charged Galaxy Nexus on the nightstand (but left it unplugged), went to sleep, and when I awoke seven hours later it was completely unresponsive. It won't turn on, charge, display a charging icon or LED light, or even reset. I have insurance for the phone, but this raises two issues: First, nobody's phone should just stop working overnight for no reason, particularly a premier gadget like the Galaxy Nexus. Second, because it doesn't have an SD card (seriously, why?!), I lose the 200+ pictures I took on recent trips, aaand whatever confidential/personal info I have on that phone will be available to the first enterprising Verizon employee who figures out how to fix it once they give me a new one O.o After this mishap, the annoying "no service" bug, and the lack of facebook contact integration (again, why?!) I would definitely take my Droid X back in a heartbeat.
All your photos should be on Google+ (not sure if you have to set this up or what). It was one of the highlights of the phone so I'm not sure how you missed this if you took a lot of photos...
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EPT![[image loading]](http://www.valuesphere.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/p910i_main.jpg)
